2 of the best compliments paid to a race director

Yesterday marked the culmination of almost a year of planning for a big national event that we had been hired to help produce. Run for Good was hired to do all the very local stuff, including all things course which consisted of finding a course, getting permits, arranging for street closures and no parking, measuring the course, notifying residents and businesses that would be impacted, marking the course, cleaning up afterward, planning for water stations and medical, getting volunteers out to their positions.. So basically everything that makes a race a race, aside from the finish line festival.

It had been a year of back and forth with the City, hours of planning, hundreds of emails and phone calls. 3 days of going door to door for neighborhood notifications, 4 days of course measurement where literally I walked the entire 5K and Half Marathon courses with my trusty measuring wheel, doing very hard S.A.T style math problems.

It was our first time working for a national race series and it was definitely a learning experience.

After a very harried, very very early morning we had finally gotten everything done and set up, the race had started. My crew and I went back out to ensure that the course was, well, coursing. It was in fact. We saw everyone making all the right turns and volunteers exactly where they needed to be. That fact alone was great enough to ease my stress that had been building about this event.

When we happened upon the Mile 8 mile marker (which were beasts of things to set up) the banner had shifted in the wind so that participants could not see it at all. We stopped to fix said banner when the best 2 compliments came my way, right at the moment I needed them most.

The first was a woman runner, as she saw the mile marker being swung back into place, looked at her GPS watch and said to us, "You know, these have been dead on!" That made my 4 days of measuring seem worth it. The second came literally on the heels of the first compliment. A gentleman running with a Run Like The Wind shirt. Oh, what joy! I ran with him for a few paces and told him I was the race director for that event and he said, "oh yeah, I remember, that was great and so is this!"

A race director's job is hard, often times thankless, we have to take the fall for all the problems, listen to complaints, deal with stress and behind the scenes work that goes totally un-noticed. But, just sometimes, there is something that happens that makes it all worth it. Usually I see it at the finish line when people are smiling, happy and sometimes crying with the joy of accomplishment. Or in the thanks we get after we have donated all of our money. But, sometimes it happens out on the course, when you need it most.

Other compliments a race director likes to hear:
- Heard at Run Like the Wind - "That downhill mile was the best mile of my entire life!"
- Seen at Run Scared 5K - a wheel chaired man, being pushed by a friend, with a beaming smile as they crossed the finish line who said "thank you for allowing me to feel normal and have some fun!" He then made a large donation to the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society.
- Heard at Run Like the Wind - "That was awful, I loved it!" (Sometimes you gotta be brutal on your participants!)
- Heard at Good Karma 5K - "That was my first race ever and I am hooked!" She then signed up for several of our other races.

There are many others, but it was a long day yesterday and my brain needs a rest.

So, to those two runners yesterday, thank you for easing my morning and I hope you had a great rest of your race!